The runners and riders in the future of Wales.

So the interim report from the Commission on the Constitution in Wales has been released and surprise surprise the Commission finds that the present system of government in Wales is not sustainable.

Neither are the three alternatives a surprise.

A reformed devolution, the preference of the First Minister.

The  not quite halfway house of Federalism.

Independence.

The Commission has identified these as the three viable options. 

Not unexpected, but interesting that Independence has at last been conceded as an option by an official report.

The constraints on the Commission means that it gives no more weight to one option over the others, nor does it appear it will recommend one option over the others at the completion of its work.

This piece has no such constraints.

The Commission's next step, it says, is to examine these options in more detail and so then shall we.

So what should we be looking for in deciding which constitutional arrangement is best for Wales.

What do we mean by best for Wales?

To live in a clean, green environment and have an economy that contributes to that. That has to be on the list.

To have affordable, quality housing, sufficient for the nation's needs.

A constitution that enables Wales to be an open and internationalist economy and country, free to trade with, make agreements, pacts and alliances with whoever it wishes to mutual benefits.

More basically. Pensions that better reflect the needs of the people of Wales and aligned to the best internationally.

Wages that are no longer lower than even the UK average.

A health and social care system properly funded, valuing its workers and providing a service that Wales can be proud of, not one it has to suffer.

An education system that gives Welsh children the opportunity to be up with the best

Properly funded local services, arts, libraries, leisure facilities, together with council services that contribute to people's welfare.

Most of these rely on finance, the money to function, to provide the necessary improvements.

All of them require constitutional change.

So which of the options can provide both the finance and the change.

Reformed Devolution.

Mr Drakeford and the Welsh Labour government base their reform on their Reforming our Union.

And a pretty hefty wish list it is.

It has been called Independence without responsibility, so far reaching its ambitions.

It does however, rely on a Labour government in Westminster, the Tories have no intention of extending powers to Wales.

And then along comes Gordon Brown and torpedoes Mr Drakefords ambitions.

Gordon Brown's ideas have a much more modest, almost non existent practical  further devolution to Wales. And it is on Mr Brown's recommendations that a future Westminster Labour government, even if that event occurs, will be based.

So what from Reformed Devolution.

Gordon Brown's proposals for improved representation and abolishment of the House of Lords is aimed primarily at elevating the English regions and pacifying Scotland. They will, if implemented, consolidate devolution, without practically improving it.

Financial control and policy remains with Westminster.

With the Gordon Brown proposals very little further devolution is proposed. Police and Justice has no mention other than Youth Justice to Wales.

No proposal to devolve Crown Estate responsibilities as in Scotland.

No additional borrowing powers, not unexpected with central financial control.

Even with powers anticipated by the Welsh government it is difficult to see where this model will improve Wales economy and thereby the improvements associated.

Police and Justice devolution, although increasing legitimacy, will not add to Wales economy.

Crown Estate devolution adds £12 million per year plus £38 million to a green fund in Scotland. Additional revenue, but hardly setting the economy alight 

Without the means of economic growth, there will not be associated growth in revenues, therefore the block grant appears to be the future and that is controlled by Westminster.

This option relies almost entirely on trust.

Stick with us and everything will be okay.

The advocates of this option for Wales fail to quantify any benefits. Not how many extra health workers. teachers, roads it can build, how much it will improve public services. Not even a less precise projection such as anticipated growth.

Much of the reason of course, is because such projections are out of their hands, for how much Wales will will get from this option, depends entirely on economic performance and policy decisions from elsewhere.

Federalism.

A more rigid system than devolution. It more readily defines responsibilities and decision making. It is however much more complicated and difficult to implement.

A UK federal system would be unique involving both nations and regions of a nation. 

Wales, for example would be a nation, part of the UK, whilst the North West region of England would still be part of England and a federal part of the UK,

Would a region such as the North West of England be prepared for less autonomy than Wales, despite having a bigger population. Would any proposed federal system be prepared to give them the autonomy of federal governments.

Federalism suffers the same drawbacks as devolution in that it also has centralised financial         control and fiscal decision making. limiting the activities of nations such as Wales for economic advancement.

Representation in the new federal system will also be problematic in a federal UK. The established federal systems such as the USA and Germany for example, are dominated by the larger states in decision making.

The proposals for UK reform from the UK Labour party go nowhere close to a ‘ federal ‘ system. 

The the proposals in these reforms to enshrine the devolved constitutions, are only enshrining

rights decided by Westminster.

As stated previously, any idea that Westminster  [ 85% England ] is going to give significant influence, power, or control, to the 4.8 %. that is Wales ,is either arrogant or delusional, 

The option of federalism would seem to have huge obstacles to overcome, to be of benefit to Wales.

Consideration of the timescale too.

The Institute of Government estimated Gordon Brown's proposals, modest as they are, would take at least 10 years, the Commission itself estimated double that

That is assuming of course that agreement on its form and substance can be reached, assuming it retains any priority, and also assuming that Scotland and N. Ireland haven't moved on in that time

Independence.

Mr Drakeford  in answer to criticism on not increasing the pay offer to nurses, given to the BBC, stated.

It is simply the truth that the amount of money we get for public services and pay in Wales is a consequence of the decisions that English ministers make for England.

That's just the way the system is.

This passive acceptance of ‘ Wales lot ‘, based of course on Mr Drakefords increasingly unsustainable Unionist dogma,  is the latest Welsh government whinge about the unfairness of it all.

But while Mr Drakeford fiddles, Welsh people suffer [ no corrections please, poetic licence ].

The Royal College of Nursing in Wales responded.

A Wales-only solution is needed rather than blaming UK government funding.

This is a Welsh problem.

We are talking about Welsh nurses in Welsh communities.

We need to find a Welsh solution to this……….

She is correct of course, Mr Drakeford in particular. seem to have made something of an art of blaming the Westminster government for Wales problems, while extolling the virtues of belonging to the ‘Union ‘.

Of course in Mr Drakefords dream world, all would be well if there was a Labour government in Westminster, so just hang in there.

Of course the reality is, that there would be no more money coming to Wales in that eventuality.

Wales might be responsible for youth justice though

That should give comfort to the nurses.

So how could Wales afford a nurses pay rise and all the other deserving workers in Wales.

Mr Drakeford says Wales cant afford it.

Well instead of sustaining a system that is only going to bring further suffering, he could throw his weight behind developing and alternative system, 

Without the dogma or any nationalist fervour, Independence can offer a better alternative.

Leaving aside the social and welfare advantages of Independent actions. From hard economic and environmental perspectives Independence can do it.

Scotland, who have long been less passive in its acceptance of ‘ the system ‘, continually strive to show that they can manage without the ‘Union ‘. Mr Drakeford,  on the other hand,, the opposite.

In his interview in the Irish Times, Mr Drakeford stated that he had never believed that Wales was so poor. Yet in every public utterance he has indicated the opposite. That Wales depends on Westminster for its economic survival.

Mr Drakeford and the Welsh Labour government are wrong. 

This reliance only exists in their dogmatic Unionist world.

It doesn't exist in an Independent Wales and the facts show it.

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This quote from the Engineer, the UKs leading engineering publication.

The Celtic sea and coastal waters around Wales have a higher concentration of renewable energy resources than perhaps anywhere else on the planet.

Wales' geography, particularly tidal resources,means that every form of marine energy is abundant.

Marine Energy Wales has identified that the 1200 km of Wales coastline has the potential for 8 GigaWatts  capacity for marine and tidal power.

The Carbon Trust have identified 2 GigaWatts of offshore wind turbine capacity,

An investigation on behalf of Crown Estates found the potential off the Welsh coast of 4 GigaWatts of floating turbine capacity in the short term and a further 20 GigaWatts by 2045.

That is 14 GigaWatts capacity off the Welsh coast  in Wales waters in the short/medium term.

Leaving aside that this is more than Wales total energy use [ 10 GigaWatts approx ] and would make Wales self-sufficient in cheap, renewable, green energy,  the economic gain is huge.

14 GigaWatts capacity at today's wholesale electricity price of £214 per MegaWatt/hr, as capped by the UK government, would realise £26 billion per annum.

The 20 GigaWatts longer term would realise £36 billion per year, at today's prices. 

That should help towards the nurses' pay rise.

So £26 billions to invest in the Welsh economy and services, if Wales had control of these resources.

Welsh wages and industrial productivity ate below even the UK average.

Both these problems are a consequence of historic lack of investment.

The Wales Governance Centre has identified that investment in research and development and transport and infrastructure has been 75% of the UK average.

This underinvestment, particularly in technology and skills has led to the lower than average wales and productivity in Wales.

They have quantified the loss.

They say that if earnings in Wales were at the UK average, it would add £5.4 billion to Wales revenues..

Research carried out by the UK government found a direct connection between investment in innovation and productivity. The more innovation, the more productivity.

Wales' investment in innovation is only 65% of the UK average and less than 50% of the EU average..

Consequently its productivity is lower.

A report by National Westminster Bank, estimated that if Wales productivity was on a par with the UK average, it would add £1.5 billion per year to the Welsh economy.

More ambitiously, Deloittes found that if Wales productivity  was the the level of Germany, it would add £7.2 billion to the Welsh economy.

The rest of the Wales economy.

 To provide businesses with good career paths. To retain young talent.

Cyber Security.

Wales attracts £0.5 million investment in this sector. Just 1% of UK investment.

Israel, not a big country, attracts over £8 billion in investment and exports over £9 billion.

How do they do it? They invested in a five year plan setting up 80 centres in cyber security education and training.

Compound Semiconductors. 

This sector has an estimated global market of $ 450 billion, projected to rise to $893 billion by 2029.

Wales has a foothold in this market with Newport Wafers, a company producing semiconductors. Newport Wafers is also an integral part of the semiconductor hub based around Swansea University, providing a production facility for testing and scaling up new products.

Newport Wafers is about to be sold off.

This is in line with the £42 billion worth of this technology sold by the UK government in recent years, Newport Wafers being the last remaining asset.

Space Science.

The University of Leicester makes the argument that space technology is not just for larger countries as perhaps 40 years ago.

It is also about fixing challenges here on earth, from communication to environmental climate change data.

They criticise the UK plan for this sector as largely aspirational and without the necessary funding.

 Space projects is one of the fastest growing sectors in the UK with an income of £14.7 billions. The Uk are aiming to achieve 10% of the global market of £400 billion.

Wales however, are largely behind in this sector. There are only 470 people employed in this technology in Wales.

Wales ambition seems largely to rest, according to Vaughan Gethin the minister responsible, as achieving Wales population share of whatever the UK achieves.

We do have the innovation in Wales, but not the investment. Space Forge, Cardiff based, are about to put Wales first satellite into space.

It is retrievable and renewable and will conduct experiments using the unique conditions of space

This innovative enterprise was 13 months without a unit to work from. Presently this technology is being produced in a unit previously used for making burger vans.

That's the present Wales technological environment

Artificial Intelligence [ AI ].

Price Waterhouse has estimated that AI will improve the UK GDP by about 10.4% by 2030 in an increase of £232 billion.

So how much of this will come to Wales.

Not a lot on present trends.

AI is highly concentrated in London, with 65%  of all AI business Headquarters there.

With the cities with the highest concentration of AI companies outside of London, Wales does not have one in the top ten.

Price Waterhouse also estimated the gains in trade from AI to the individual nations of the UK.

Wales was bottom again.

We could go on, but only gets more depressing.

So there's the choice.

Space science, semiconductors, cyber security AI, Wales is being stifled in  developing these sectors by lack of control and finance,  thereby losing multi billions of pounds of revenue.

But Wales has the means to invest in its economy, including these sectors, with billions from energy sources and revenues.

So the question should not be, can we afford Independence, but rather, can we afford to stay in the Union.

 

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